Another weekend, another adventure for me.  Today I buggered off to Aberdeen alone, for the matinee performance Monty Python’s Spamalot.  Why on my own?  Well, most of my friends aren’t Python fans and my family don’t like it at all (what?!).  Also, when I looked at the seating plan, there was only 1 single seat left in the front row and I wanted it.

I caught the (expensive) train to Aberdeen, and on arriving, I wandered into Union Square for the first time.  It’s massive!  I went for a wander to the Apple Store and had a quick go of an iPad but I’m still of the opinion it’s a big iPhone.  It would be good for e-books though- think of how well it’s doing compared to Amazon’s Kindle.  For the record, I don’t want one.

Anyway, onto Spamalot….

When I walked into the theatre, there was a loud, majestic score playing and I think everyone knew at that point that they were in for a great afternoon.  I took my place in my front row seat (oh yes), which was practically like sitting on the stage and shortly after that, the show began.

There’s an announcement at the start saying it’s ok to take pictures, let your phones ring and tweet throughout the show.  This is followed by an “oh no, you’re NOT allowed to do any of those things.  Shit….”.

Before I continue any further, I don’t want to spoil the show for anyone who hasn’t seen it yet, so I’ll try and keep it brief(ish).  If you’ve seen Monty Python and the Holy Grail you’ll know what’s coming.  Some of my favourite parts-

- The first song involved fish and slapping.  If you’re a Python fan, do I really need to say anymore?

- “Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life”- the Rocky Horror Show has the Timewarp as the ending singalong/get up and dance section.  Spamalot has this.  Cheery song and was a great way to end 2 hours of hilarity.

One of the funniest performers was probably Todd Carty (you’ll know him as Tucker from Grange Hill or Mark Fowler from Eastenders, depending on your age).  He played Patsy and had some of the best facial expressions (not to mention the shapes he pulled during the “Laker Girls Cheer Song”.

There was a bit of a funny moment near the beginning of the show too….

When all the knights came out on stage, there was one, Sir Bedivere (played by Robin Armstrong I think) who was wearing glasses.  As it turned out, I was the only person in my row wearing glasses and somehow we both caught each others eye at the same time (think it was to do with the specs).  Anyway, I was sitting laughing at something at that point.  He stared at me and grinned, I stared at him, we both laughed, then the people sitting next to me started laughing

To conclude (sounding all serious now), it was a fantastic show (I know, I know, I seem to say that about everything I see but it was brilliant).  If you want an afternoon/evening of silliness, go see Spamalot.  I giggled though the entire show and my mascara was all over my face.  This is something I want to see again

What are you waiting for?

Note: I’ve heard there’s a UK cast recording being released soon.  I’ll be having that.

Mood : silly   Music : Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life  by  Spamalot Cast

My friend Di and I decided to venture down to Edinburgh for the day, to see what was going on at the Fringe. We had a 2 hour train journey to get there and it was a beautiful day traveling right down the coast. It didn’t even feel like 2 hours but maybe that’s because we were yapping so much.

Passing Murrayfield Stadium brought back some old memories…that’s where we’d queued for hours in the pouring rain to get near the front at the Bryan Adams concert back in 2007 (entirely my idea, I hasten to add).

On arriving at Waverly Station, we weren’t quite sure what to do first. It was lunchtime so we grabbed some food from the station and went and sat beside the Scott Monument. The first thing we noticed: the place was mobbed! It was a lovely sunny day so everyone was making the best of it.

We headed up the mound, with the intention of walking down the Royal Mile. Whilst walking up there, we got our first flyer of the day. A guy walked up to us and said “your days are numbered”. Sounds rather ominous, doesn’t it? No, no, just a part of the Fringe madness.

Finally, we arrived at the top of the Mile (it’s a wee bit of a climb). As soon as we looked around, we saw some living statues. I took a few pictures (had the SLR with me) but when I went to take a picture of one of the performers in a mirrored costume, he held out his hand! What’s the deal with that?! You’re the one standing in a public place dude.

Diabolo Street Performer
There was a guy on Mile, just next to St Giles Cathedral performing with a Diabolo (these seemed to be very popular this year). I can’t say if he was good or bad or what he was actually doing. If you haven’t met me, I’m a bit of a shortarse and couldn’t really see through the sizable crowd.

St Giles Cathedral
As I previously mentioned, the guy with the Diabolo was performing right next to St Giles Cathedral, a place I’d never visited. Now, I’m not a religious person, however, the architecture of some of these old buildings is pretty amazing. On entering the building, I was struck by how quiet and peaceful it was inside, in complete juxtaposition with the atmosphere outside.

It’s a beautiful place and I was stunned by the size of it (I was wondering what services must be like there). The stained glass windows were also amazing and I ended up taking quite a few photos of them. If you’ve not been there yet, visit it next time you’re in Edinburgh- well worth a look.

The RBS Royal Mile
This is the craziest part of the Mile. You walk down there and you will get flyered. What did I see there? The cast of Sector 17 the musical performing on a small stage, a Nazi version of Oliver Twist, people dressed as fairies skipping around, people dressed as Guantanamo Bay prisoners, guys handing out newspapers while wearing nothing but underwear, people sitting on the street using typewriters and a clown playing AC/DC’s “Back In Black” on a Guitar Hero guitar….

Really crazy and very busy. It was nigh on impossible to move at times- it was a sea of people and you just had to go with the flow. Loved it though.

Japanese Performer
This guy was performing just down from Starbucks. When we arrived to see what was going on, there was a already a large crowd but the performer was blowing a whistle and yelling at people to move forward. He took ages to get started and he continued to shout at the crowd which really began to annoy me. He was good though (especially at the end) where he juggled fire whilst balancing on a suitcase, a diabolo, pieces of wood and tins of Sainsbury’s sweetcorn.

Another thing that annoyed me around that area were the parents who were pushing their kids into the crowd. One woman demanded that I let her son through and proceeded to barge in. I didn’t move- if you want to see something, get there early, as I did. And another thing: I’ve already pointed out that I’m vertically challenged. Now, some kids are taller than me (children are giants these days) and if I let them stand in front of me, I wouldn’t be able to see! Sorry to sound like a grump but c’mon people!

The Guest Speakers
A follower of mine on Twitter informed me there were some free comedy shows down on Niddry Street so we headed that way. We came across Laughing Horse Comedy @ The Hive so we went in and walked to a wee room called the small cave. The show that was about to start was “The Guest Speakers” so we stayed for that.

It was a comedy sketch show where a variety of people (all played by the same person) come out on stage and give a (hilarious) motivational talk. The characters were introduced by another guy, who was supposed to be mopey and depressed. Eventually he tries (and fails) to dress up as the Joker from Batman.

There’s a link about the show here. The guy playing the various speakers was Rob Gilroy, and he was brilliant. The best character was probably Valerie the child psychologist- funny stuff . Think it’s the last day of the show today.

The Red Trouser Show
Heading back up the Royal Mile, we saw another large crowd waiting for street performers to start. This time, it was 2 American guys who called themselves The Red Trouser Show. They were very entertaining, juggling fire, pulling random people out of the audience to hold a ladder in the middle of the street and getting a child to help out in the act (he earned a fiver in the process!). Funny guys.

Princes Street Gardens
Once we were off the Mile, we found these giant set of steps that took us along by the National Galleries and we ended up wandering through Princes Street Gardens. Because it was a beautiful, sunny day, the park was packed! There were a few Chinese performers dancing in around in there too. I could have sat in there for hours but time was running out and we had to go catch our train home.

*                  *                     *

After a quick snack in a shopping centre, we headed back into Waverly and began the journey home. Again, the journey flew by and much yapping was done on the way home. I got back to my house just after 9pm, thoroughly knackered but very happy. What a fantastic day

If you want to see some pictures from the day- check out Flickr.

Mood : bouncy   Music : Barrowland Ballroom  by  Amy MacDonald

I was reading the technology section of the BBC News website this morning and came across the article announcing that the plug has been pulled on Google Wave.

Back in November 2009, a friend sent me an invite to join the service (people were still clamoring for an invite at that time). I posted a review after I used it and definitely saw the benefit of it, in terms of a corporate or educational environment (namely for team working).

The BBC article stated that “Many people who tried Wave complained that it was too hard to use or that they did not understand why they would use it.”. I think this is probably true of the average computer user who might only own a PC for browsing the net, gaming and keeping in touch with friends and family. They wouldn’t have much of a need for this type of a collaborative tool, which is probably why it didn’t catch on in the way Google hoped it would.

I’m sure we haven’t heard the last of this type of tool and no doubt Google is developing something just as innovative as we speak.

Mood : awake   Music : Bang A Gong  by  T-Rex

I’ve had news for a couple of weeks now which I haven’t yet blogged about.  Here goes-

I have a new job.  Not a permanent job mind you- a 2 month temporary contract (remember I’m back at uni in September to start writing up my Masters dissertation).  Technically, I’m back at uni now, because that’s where I’m working as an assistant web developer, developing an internal project for 8 weeks.

The project itself consists of producing reports from a vast database system, and presenting the appropriate data on a web page.  I’ve already been at the job for 3 weeks and it’s been fantastic to have the opportunity to use both ColdFusion and Oracle in a real-world environment.  As some of you will know, I’m more experienced in the use of PHP and MySQL, so I’ve had the tendency to develop sites using those technologies when I’ve had the choice.  As a result, I’ve only used ColdFusion twice in the past, and was under the impression that it was a bit rubbish compared to PHP.  I now realise I was wrong (note: “dear diary” moment- I’ve admitted I was wrong.  This won’t happen again for some time).

Week 4 starts tomorrow and it’s hard to believe how quickly time has flown.  Really enjoying it though and it’s satisfying to see everything coming together

This evening, I plugged my iPhone into my computer and when iTunes opened, it informed me there was an update available. I like to keep my software up-to-date, so I started to download the OS update. Big mistake.

The download itself took a short while but when it was ready, I tried to install it. Back in February I updated to version 3.1.3 and more recently, I updated to iOS 4 and had no problems. This time, the update bar on my phone got to about a quarter full and then it just stopped. I thought it might be because it was a large update so I left it for over an hour. When I returned to my desk, it hadn’t moved. That’s when I started to panic.

Obviously, I couldn’t eject my iPhone because it thought it was still updating so I just removed the USB cable. I reset it a couple of times and tried again. The update bar froze. I reset it once more. Guess what? It froze. I’d read reports on the web that some people had “bricked”* their iPhones during the update process.

Apple doesn’t have any offical way of letting you downgrade the OS on the iPhone so I couldn’t get back to iOS 4. After a bit of googling, I found a way of perhaps fixing the phone (which by this point was demanding that I plug it into iTunes to restore it…but that didn’t work!).

Anyway, if you’re having problems, first of all, disconnect your phone and reset it (hold the button at the top and the home button at the same time for a few seconds) and make sure you’ve closed iTunes.

Secondly, try removing the iOS 4.0.1 update (the file may have been corrupted when it was downloading). To do this navigate to-

• Documents and Settings\\Application Data\Apple Computer\iTunes\iPhone Software Updates (Windows)
• Library/iTunes/iPhone Software Updates (Mac)

When you’re in the right directory, there should be a file with the extension .ipsw. Delete this. Now reconnect the phone, open iTunes and try to restore it again. Deleting the .ipsw file forces iTunes to re-download it. This time it should work (it did for me).

Of course, you could just not install the iOS 4.0.1 update

*This is the word the cool kids use to describe an iPhone which is farked. I’d never heard of the term until tonight. Clearly I’m not cool enough.

Mood : aggravated   Music : You're Gonna Go Far, Kid  by  The Offspring

Ever since I’d seen the Rocky Horror Show at His Majesty’s Theatre in Aberdeen back in 2006, I’d wanted to see it again.

I, along with my sister, one of my cousins and one of my best friends all headed to the theatre to see the show this time around. I’d booked early and had managed to snag 3rd row seats for us (given the small size of the theatre, these are practically on the stage).

On arriving at the theatre and purchasing a programme, we discovered that David Bedella wouldn’t be performing in this show and instead, the part of Frank-N-Furter would be played by Stuart Ellis. I must say, I was a bit disappointed by this as I thought David was brilliant back in 2006 and I was looking forward to seeing him play the part again. Nevertheless Stuart did a fantastic job stepping into the role.

The show started bang on 7.30pm, with the band bursting into life for the opening number, “Science Fiction Double Feature”. Hilarity ensued from there onwards.

Just in case you didn’t know, Rocky Horror Show is one of the few shows where you are allowed to shout back at the actors on the stage (at appropriate times of course). There were some absolute crackers in Aberdeen tonight . Now I know that my family read my blog, so I’ll refrain from putting some of the ruder callouts on here. Anyway, here are some of the funny moments-

Columbia: I loved you, I loved you and what did you give me?
Audience Member: Herpes!

Rocky: Is it true that you that you don’t like men with big muscles Janet?
Audience Member: Just one big one!

Gerrard Kelly (narrator) to loud, obnoxious audience member: “You’re sitting in the dark surrounded by 2000 strangers. I’m on stage with a microphone. God has a plan, you’re not in it. Zip it!”

I wasn’t really sure what was going on during “There’s a Light” as I heard a bit of a commotion in the middle of the stalls. As it turns out, some idiots sitting in the dress circle had brought water pistols to simulate the rain for the scene. Totally inappropriate for the theatre.

I think the funniest part in the show was the bedroom scene between Brad and Frank-N-Furter. Again I’m not going to go into great detail other than that there was a great deal of hilarity because someone coughed up a hairball. Mid delivery of a line, Brad guffawed with laughter. Midway through the scene Riff Raff popped in and he was on the verge of laughter too. The audience was in hysterics (and I was crying with laughter). It’s the first time I’ve seen actors crack up like that on stage

At the end, there was a encore, where the audience had to do the Time Warp (I think everyone knows the dance). Fantastic party atmosphere!  One question though: how can the men on stage dance in such high heels?!  It’s not fair- I can’t even walk in the bloomin’ things

Overall the evening was absolutely brilliant though and I’ll be there next time the show comes back!

Mood : chipper   Music : Time Warp  by  Rocky Horror Show Cast

I’ve now scrobbled 80,000 songs via last.fm. One could say that I listen to too much music…..

Anyway, the 80,000th song was “Heartache Tonight” by Michael Bublé. It’s from his latest album Crazy Love and was originally an Eagles song.

Here’s to the next milestone!

Mood : blah   Music : Home  by  Michael Bublé

Yesterday evening, I attended the Proclaimers gig at Montrose Town Hall. The concert was the main event for the hugely successful Montrose Music Festival which ran from 28th-30th May. Normally, the headlining act play at the very beginning of the festival although this time, the Proclaimers had other gigs planned so that’s why it was delayed.

One of the luxuries of attending a gig relatively close to home is that there’s no lengthy amount of travelling involved. Doors were at 7pm: I left my house at 6.50pm. Despite the fact it was a sunny evening, it was quite chilly. The doors opened 15 minutes late so at that point, I was regretting leaving my jersey in the car. When I did get in, the place was empty- I could have wandered up to the barrier for a place but I knew better after going to the Deacon Blue concert there last year. The hall gets *really* hot and there’s no air conditioning. Last time, I popped out into the corridor several times to cool down. Originally, I was going to be attending the concert alone but as it turned out, 4 of my family members were there so I spent the evening with them

I’m not sure what time the support act Tommy Reilly came on at, but he didn’t seem to be on too long (unless time went by really quickly). Think he was off the stage by about 8.20pm so he might only have been on 20-25 minutes? I thought he was alright- I seem to be quite into acoustic music right now. He didn’t really get the crowd going but that’s because there was still a general lack of crowd. Had the place been a little fuller, I think he would have gone down quite well. Apparently he’s got an album coming out very soon so all the best to him.

After standing around for a little while and chatting to my family, one of the roadies appeared on stage at 8.45pm to introduce the Proclaimers. They launched into Notes and Rhymes. Cue the crowd going nuts (and rightfully so). Admittedly, I don’t know many of the their songs but I knew all the main ones. You can’t grow up in Scotland and not know the words to I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles). That said, here are my highlights-

Notes and Rhymes- I didn’t know this song before the concert but it did a good of getting the crowd going.

Letter from America- again, this is one if their more well known songs. Of course, the whole place was singing along.

I’m On My Way- everyone knows this one, young and old. Back in 2001 it was included on the Shrek soundtrack so even kids know this tune. People were clapping, singing and stomping on the old wooden floor.

Sunshine on Leith- a sad song which had people waving their phones. There was even a guy waving a lighter in the front row- is this even allowed any more!?

I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)- this is the song I wanted to hear live. Like I said before, you can’t grow up in Scotland and not know this song. When you’re at an event and this song is played, people generally go nuts. It was brilliant tonight!

One other thing I’d like to say about the show- what a fantastic lighting set-up they had.  Really pretty colours and all done without the use of strobe lighting (which kinda annoys me).

Normally, concerts finish around 10.45pm-11pm as that’s around the time for curfew when you’re in a residential area. However, just after 500 Miles, the band went off stage (this was about 10pm). As the crowd began stomping and chanting “we want more, we want more!” I was quickly trying to send a text home saying I was going to need picked up ASAP. The band came back on for the encore and finished at 10.10pm. That was it. It took at good while to get out of the hall considering that I was quite near the front by the end. It was really strange to see that it was still light outside too

Overall, I enjoyed the concert as it had a great atmosphere however, I thought it was a little on the short side (this coming from the girl who is a bit spoiled in terms of the artists she’s seen perform……Bruce Springsteen and his 3 hour set at Hampden and so on……).

It wasn’t until after the concert that I realised that there was a distinct lack of banter with the crowd. The band gave a few song dedications along the lines of “this song is for so and so” and said they remembered visiting Montrose once but that was about it. Yes, people go to concerts for the music but banter between the crowd and the band is all a part of that and it was something that was missing last night. Other than that, it was a good night

The Proclaimers (taken with my mobile)

Here’s a setlist I swiped from another website-

Notes and Rhymes
Born Innocent
What Makes You Cry?
Letter From America
Cap in Hand
I’m On My Way
Sweet Little Girls
The Light
Sean
In Recognition
Whole Wide World
Lets Get Married
Three More Days
You Meant It Then
Shadows Fall
Sunshine on Leith
Then I Met You
There’s a Touch
Life With You
I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)

**Encore**
Over and Done With
The Joyful Kilmarnock Blues

Mood : awake   Music : Sunshine On Leith  by  The Proclaimers

This weekend, I was supposed to attend the Montrose Music Festival. I didn’t.

I’d been looking forward to it for months and months. Even on Friday, I was planning on what bands I wanted to see. I have no idea what happened, but by the time I got up and got ready on Saturday morning, I didn’t want to go any more and that was it. Maybe it was the thought of the crowds, or the general loudness? It’s completely out of character because I love live music (and music in general). The one thing I am gutted about is that subsequently, I didn’t get to see my friends

Instead, I packed a rucksack, got the dog and headed to the beach/reserve. I stayed there for at least 3 hours, taking pictures, enjoying the sunshine and walking barefoot along the shoreline, letting the cool North Sea lap over my feet. Very relaxing.

Mood : confused

Yesterday evening, I decided that I wanted to try and install both ColdFusion and XAMPP on my MacBook, to try to get them working in conjunction with each other. I hit a few stumbling blocks along the way which were frustrating so I thought I’d write a quick guide so others could also attempt to install them. Before you start, there’s one thing to keep in mind (and it may seem a bit obvious), but you must have administrator rights as you will need to enter the password during the installation process.

Right, first things first, you’ll need to download a copy of XAMPP OS X and ColdFusion 9 (I’m a student so I use the developer edition). I’m aware that OS X does come with it’s own version of Apache however, I always used XAMPP on Windows and I wanted to continue with it.

1. Install XAMPP in the usual way- it’s really just a case of hitting next. If in doubt, follow the instructions on the XAMPP website

2. Now onto ColdFusion. Download the developer edition, unzip it and click on the installer.

3. The installer should load. Again at this stage, it’s a case of clicking “ok” and “next” to accept terms and conditions.

4. When prompted for a serial number (which you won’t have), check the box which says you are using the developer edition.

5. Then on the next screen, select the server configuration option. After that, you will be asked whether you already have a version of ColdFusion running on your machine. For an easy(ish) install ensure you don’t have an old version lurking about.

6. You will then be asked where you would like to install ColdFusion. Choose whatever you like but I found it easier to leave the default path- “/Applications/ColdFusion9″.

7. After this, you will need to configure the connector. Enter the details below:

• Web Server: Apache

• Config. Dir: /Applications/xampp/etc

• Dir and file name of server binary: /Applications/xampp/xamppfiles/bin/httpd

• Dir and file name of server control script: /Applications/xampp/xamppfiles/bin/apachectl

8. Hit next. You will then be asked where you would like to place the CFIDE folder. I put mine in /Applications/xampp/xamppfiles/htdocs but had an issue where the file permissions didn’t allow me to write anything to the directory. Set the file permissions to read and write. You can do this by navigating to the appropriate folder in Finder, right clicking on it, choosing “Get Info” and editing the “Sharing and Permissions” option which is towards the bottom of the screen.

9. Once you’ve done this, you will be prompted to enter an administrator password for the CFIDE.

10. The next screen asks if you want to set a password for RDS. Off the top of my head, I’m not really sure what that is (can’t even remember if the installer explains it) but I just ignored it and didn’t set a password. After this, it should install.

Ideally, the ColdFusion administration login should then appear, prompting you for the password you previously created. On entering it, the install should complete and bam, everything should work. If it does, then great, go get a cup of tea. if it doesn’t, get a cup of tea anyway- you’re going to be sitting in front of your computer for a little longer.

In my case, whenever i tried to open a .cfm file, my browser tried to save it, meaning that it didn’t know how to render it into a webpage. “Easy fix” I thought. If something like this happens, you may need to tell Apache it’s ok and that these files can be opened. Navigate to /Applications/xampp/xamppfiles/etc/httpd.conf. Make a back-up of this file just in case anything goes horribly, horribly wrong. Find the line that says DirectoryIndex and has something like index.php index.html beside it. Add index.cfm. This may solve your problem (if you’re having a problem that is).

I then decided to check out the ColdFusion connector log which can be found at /Applications/ColdFusion9/ConnectorInstall0.txt. In here, I discovered the connector hadn’t been created!

To recreate it, go to /Applications/ColdFusion9/ColdFusion Launcher. Hit the Webserver Connector Utility and enter the same information as provided in step 7. You will need to hit Advanced to enter all the info. The only checkbox which you must tick is the one which says to configure the webserver for ColdFusion9 applications. Once you hit ok, your httpd.conf file for XAMPP will have been edited. At around line 500 or so, you will see code which says something like-

# JRun Settings
LoadModule jrun_module /Applications/ColdFusion9/runtime/lib/wsconfig/1/mod_jrun22.so

Don’t worry, this is good. Try and start Apache in the XAMPP control panel. Bet it still doesn’t work? Bet it comes up with an error saying that it cannot load mod_jrun22.so into the server (or something like that). Chances are, ColdFusion is still trying to use the wrong type of connector. I don’t know why it does it- it’s annoying. Anyway, the right version of the connector is sitting on your computer- you’re almost there….

Navigate to Applications/ColdFusion9/runtime/lib/ and copy and paste the wsconfig.jar to your desktop. Open it using the archiving utility and there should be a folder called “connectors”. Inside this, there is one called “apache”. Open it. Here’s all the correct connectors. If you are using a MacBook Pro, choose the intel-macosx folder. Within that, there’s a prebuilt folder and finally inside it, here are the appropriate files! Copy the mod_jrun22.so file. Put the file into the /Applications/ColdFusion9/runtime/lib/wsconfig/1/mod_jrun22.so directory, overwriting the old one. Try starting Apache now. It should work. At this stage, you should then be able to complete the installation by following the steps for the CFIDE login in your browser.

So, XAMPP and ColdFusion will be able to work in harmony with each other. Cool, huh? It’s ok, you can thank me later

A guide which was particularly helpful at the early stages can be found at the following link- How I installed ColdFusion 8 on Mac OS X by Renaun Erickson

Mood : blah   Music : California  by  Phantom Planet